Everything was going smoothly — for, like, two minutes. There Elijah sat, patiently it seemed, cupping his tiny hands so Jen Cohn could sprinkle seeds for him to bury into the soil of a plant they were preparing.

Suddenly, my 3-year-old son snapped his head up. "Turtles!" he shouted, as if remembering the answer to a question from a half hour ago. He darted from outside the covered space of one side of Longue Vue Garden's Lucy C. Roussel Discovery Garden, across the paved main circle and off to another corner — right past the turtles he'd discovered earlier in the day.

Cohn smiled. That's life at the "Kinder Garden," a one-hour, seasonally themed series that allows caregivers to bring children from ages 18 months to 3 years old into a highly interactive outdoor learning space. Here, they can take advantage of the modest area's multiple options, whether it's playing in what looks like the world's smallest sandbox, digging for worms near a compost area (and feeding those nearby turtles), learning to plant red beans, or just driving their stubby fingers through gobs of goo made from corn starch and water.

KINDER GARDEN'S 'SUMMER FUN IN THE SUN'

What: Longue Vue's seasonal, themed series allows caregivers to bring children from ages 18 months to 3 years old into a highly interactive outdoor learning space.

Flexibility reigns on these Tuesday mornings; Cohn, Longue Vue's education and programs coordinator, and her co-workers have to be prepared to handle as many as 30 caregivers and kids, or, as on our recent Tuesday visit, Eli and me, and Suzanne Daly and her 2-year-old granddaughter, Adrienne. They rarely call the guardians "parents," because, due to the weekday morning setting, the Kinder Garden series is perfect for not just parents but also baby-sitters, nannies or grandparents like Daly.

No matter what they're called, the guardians are as important to the experience as the kids, Cohn said.

"This program is design for the toddler and the caregiver," Cohn said. "We do a lot of things that parents can do at home. So we try to teach parents how to teach the child while teaching the child out in our garden — to teach the parent and the child at the same time.

"And we incorporate a lot of different activities to promote motor skills, math, science and literacy, as well as creativity and balance, and exploration. There's a wide range of different activities that push the toddlers into all of those different realms."

The series plays to the different seasons, so right now it is in the middle of the "Summer Fun in the Garden" series; the hour starts roughly around 9:30 a.m. (depending on turnout).

The whole rhythm of that hour is funky, partly because, as Cohn put it, it's a "self-guided class; the toddler is the leader." Which is a polite way of saying the inmates run the prison. Eli, who is the very definition of a "handful" these days, takes command of every area he occupies — he just doesn't feel like occupying that area for terribly long. But when he's given the opportunity to fire away at a plant with a squirt water bottle — good for hand-eye coordination — he's all in, missing only about half the time.

Then he's off to blow bubbles from a bench across from the compost area, following after little Adrienne. And then it's inside the covered area to play with goo, and plant the red bean seeds (until he darts off).

While Adrienne displays Zen-like patience during the brief story-reading courtesy of Cohn, Eli can handle about three minutes before darting back to the red beans.

He's at his most content doing what contents many guys on mornings spent outdoors: fishing. He nabs at least four, and you should've seen the (wooden) ones that got away. (Fortunately, Longue Vue adheres to a strict "catch and release" fishing policy.)

Longue Vue's 'Kinder Garden'Longue Vue's Jen Cohn explains the interactive 'Kinder Garden' series for toddlers, while Suzanne Daly shares her first impressions of her granddaughter's experience with the series.

How can this only be an hour? One thing is certain; Eli's having himself a time. If I'd put my camera down long enough, I might even have learned a little myself. That will have to be the next hour.

The hour was a perfect opportunity for Suzanne Daly, who'd previously brought her other granddaughter along for visits to Longue Vue, and as a member knew it was a chance for Adrienne to have her own experience.

"She's getting an appreciation of the garden, and I think she likes that you can just let her loose in here and she can do it her way," Daly said. She gets to do whatever she wants to do for the hour, and it's building a relationship for she and I without any other family members."

The Kinder Garden series' "Summer Fun in the Garden" winds down next Tuesday (June 17). "Free Kinder Garden" provides free classes on several different Saturdays beginning this weekend (June 14). These classes, thanks to a grant from the Keller Foundation, are part of the mission to help reach out to under-served communities. The foundation also helped fund a handful of programs at the Hollygrove Market and Farm.

To increase awareness of Longue Vue's outdoor programming, there will be an Ice Cream Social on July 26, with families invited to enjoy ice cream provided courtesy of The Creole Creamery. Animal Rescue of New Orleans will also be on-site with opportunities for pet adoption. The event is $8 general admission, free for members.